[Fsfe-ie] Re: ethical interpretations of FS

Ian Clarke ian at locut.us
Tue Jan 27 12:58:57 CET 2004


Ciaran O'Riordan wrote:
> Ian Clarke <ian at locut.us> writes:
> 
>>Pointing out the potential for an undesirable scenario which doesn't
>>specifically conflict with the goal of an organization does not imply
>>that this goal must be extended to oppose that undesirable scenario.
> The goal of the Free Software movement is to give freedom to computer
> users, not just "offshore" their lack of freedom.

Strange definition of "freedom".  You should have no more "freedom" to 
see the source code of software I run on my hardware than I should have 
the "freedom" to see your GnuPG private key.

> A future of everyone using Free Software thin clients to do their
> computing on remote machines running proprietary software is not only
> undesirable, it's unacceptable, and IFSO should not endorse it.

A future of nobody being able to keep a secret is even less desirable, 
and even less acceptable, and IFSO definitely should not endorse that.

 > (as a side note, I don't think I ever asked you to disclose
> any of your source code.)

Not directly, but you did say that IFSO shouldn't use my code unless I did.

> I did previously suggest that IFSO should try 3D17 if it was Free
> Software, but after some thinking, the mailing list is probably a better
> fit since it already has sixty-something subscribers, and by email
> people can offer comments, rewordings, attachments, or hyperlinks.

The question of whether 3D17 is actually useful is a different thing 
altogether.

Ian.


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